Meet the Team
Gene Du Plessis
Owner of Star West Productions * Director * Cinamatographer * 1st AC. Gene heads up Directing, Cinematography, & Story Develoment and is Media Advisor and Drone Ops for Pura Vida Pictures. BIO: Gene's interest in film making started as an actor in his teens, and developed into a passion for the visual medium as a whole.  Since graduating from New York Film Academy in 2013, he has honed various filmmaking skills, including screenwriting, storyboarding, cinematography, camera operator, and directing. As 1st  A.C. Gene has worked on well over a hundred projects varying from short films, professional commercials, to feature films starring A list actors.  Gene co-wrote and directed his first comedy film, "Life and Death" in 2013 and went on to write and direct the international multi-award winning thriller, Herringbone.
Bianca Fortin
Founder of Pura Vida Studios * Producer * Casting Director * Award Winning Filmmaker. Bianca is the Production Organizer, Media Coordinator & Tour Facilitator for Pura Vida Pictures. BIO: Bianca started in the film industry as a child actress for commercial television. Â In her early 20's she was cast in a TV series pilot produced by a small production company for which she later interned in all areas of production, from pre-production to post, where she developed a "children's division" and wrote, co-produced, and directed the children's pilot show, "Newzies" followed by a film for television. After moving to California she worked as a casting producer/casting director on several reality shows including ABC's 'The Bachelor,' 'American Inventor', ESPN's 'I'd Do Anything,' and Shaq's Big Challenge. In 2013, she produced the short film comedy, "Life and Death," for her brother, director Gene Du Plessis. Teaming up with him again, she produced "Herringbone", a short thriller which received seven awards including Best Short Film and the Filmmaker's Humanitarian Award in 2019/2020.
Guest Industry Professionals *
A multitude of film, media, industry professionals & instructors join our team based on our distinctly different workshops, retreats, tour & production needs. * For select tours & workshops.
You
You are the creator of your own story and yours starts right here. As you join us on your journey, you will become an intricate part of our team as well.
Our Story
Great filmmaking starts with a great team!
We are a dynamic brother and sister filmmaking team, who have worked and collaborated for over 15 years on several projects from acting to multi-award winning short films. Our combined skills in directing, cinematography, camera operating, casting and producing - plus our experience in reality television, short films, feature films, music videos, infomercials and documentaries makes for a great team. We love to share our passion of filmmaking and connect filmmakers with each other. Together we created Pura Vida Pictures to offer filmmakers the best natural "sets" to network, learn, use or hone their run & gun and documentary filmmaking techniques while exploring beautiful Costa Rica.
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